Saturday, September 15, 2007

I've never been to the Amazon...one of the places I want to visit in the next few years

here's an article that might be useful to you...published on the NY Times.

Into the Amazon

By LARRY ROHTERPublished: September 16, 2007WE were in a canoe tethered to a submerged tree,fishing for piranha in the dark waters of the RioNegro, about 125 miles northwest of the Brazilian cityof Manaus. It was late afternoon, and the sun wasalready beginning to set behind a fleecy thicket ofclouds, tingeing them with hues of purple, pink andgold. Suddenly a dolphin surfaced less than 10 feetaway, carved a graceful arc in the air and thendisappeared into the water again.

The Amazon That night, back at the Anavilhanas JungleLodge, my base for that foray into the world's largesttropical rain forest, dinner � which included onionsoup with sweet potato chips, an Amazonian fish calleddourado prepared in ginger sauce, beef tenderloin andcoconut flan � gave no hint of our ruggedsurroundings. Nor did the air-conditioned cottagewhere I slept, with its elegant tropical wood panelingand modern tiled bathroom. The next morning, I soughtrefuge from the overpowering heat and humidity in thelodge's swimming pool, where I watched boats of allshapes and sizes putt-putting their way up and downthe river.

Not too long ago, options for visitors to theBrazilian Amazon region were limited: you flew toManaus, stayed at the Tropical Manaus Hotel on theoutskirts of the city, and took day trips to the edgeof the forest. But that, thankfully, is no longer thecase. Responding to the international boom inecological and adventure tourism, lodgings have sprungup all over the region in the past four or five years.Travelers with a yen for the exotic and a tolerancefor the unpredictable can now book a stay in thejungle with an expectation of, if not luxury, then atleast a reasonable degree of comfort. ( Still, don'tbe surprised when you see signs like these, posted inthe rooms at the Tiwa Amazonas Ecoresort, just acrossthe river from Manaus: �Warning: The simultaneous useof the shower and the air conditioner is forbidden!�)

There are easily a dozen of these new hotels � a typeof lodging I couldn't have imagined when I startedtraveling in the Amazon 30 years ago, often sleepingin grimy hammocks in $3-a-night fleabags with dirtfloors. The main concentration is on the Rio Negro, tothe north and west of Manaus, where the tannic acidthat darkens the water and gives the river its nameinhibits mosquitoes from breeding, so visitors don'thave to worry as much about malaria or dengue or othertypical tropical maladies.

And there are more lodgings to come. The mostambitious is a 102-room complex being built just offthe road to the town of Novo Air�o by the Accor groupof France, which is scheduled to open in 2010 and willbe the first international luxury chain hotel actuallyin the jungle; the Hilton company has also announcedplans to build a 196-room �eco-lodge resort� near NovoAir�o .

For the moment, however, the Anavilhanas Jungle Lodge,which opened in February, is the newest and perhapsthe most chic example of the lodge phenomenon.Operated by a couple from S�o Paulo, it is on a bluffabove the Rio Negro, within sight of the AnavilhanasEcological Station, a government nature reserve thatencompasses the world's largest riverine archipelago,with more than 400 islands and hundreds of lakes andigap�s, an indigenous word that means flood forest.Astonishingly rich in both animal and plant life, thereserve area, which has been designated a Unesco WorldHeritage site, is unspoiled and uninhabited.

No matter what their location, the lodges tend tofollow a certain pattern when it comes to outings. Inthe morning, for instance, before the heat gets toostifling, a nature walk is, more often than not, derigueur; I've seen all sorts of monkeys, macaws andtoucans, not to mention sloths and anteaters, on suchtreks. Afternoon excursions to fish for piranhaprovide the kind of bragging rights that delighted myteenage son when I took him with me on an Amazon tripa few years ago.

After dinner, it's often back to the boat to hunt forthe Amazonian caiman known as the jacar�. But insteadof carrying guns or spears, guides are armed withpowerful spotlights that freeze the reptiles inposition and make it possible to remove young onesfrom the water so that guests can run their hands overtheir cool, ridged carapaces.

All can arrange an excursion for you to witness the�meeting of the waters,� the spot just southeast ofManaus where the Rio Negro's dark waters converge withthose of the Amazon's other major tributary, theSolim�es. I've stopped there at least a dozen timesand never cease to be amazed at the way the two greatrivers, markedly different in color and temperature,collide with such force and volume that they seem tobe fighting each other.

But each lodge also tries to offer something itscompetitors do not. For instance, the Amazon EcoparkJungle Lodge, 40 minutes from Manaus, is famous forits �Monkey Jungle Reserve.� Here, woolly monkeys,some confiscated from contraband dealers, othersinjured, are monitored at a rehabilitation center onthe lodge grounds.

At the Anavilhanas Jungle Lodge, a group of more thana dozen botos, or gray dolphins, show up daily to befed at nearby Novo Air�o. A motorboat from the lodgetakes guests to a floating restaurant alongside themain dock there, where a pet anaconda circulates amongcustomers sipping chilled beers or soft drinks. As westood on a raft attached to the restaurant, thedolphins cavorted, sticking their long snouts up fromthe water for pieces of fish tossed their way orseizing fish snacks from tourists intrepid enough togo into the water.

�If we'd let the botos, they would spend the entireday here, just eating,� said Marisa Grangeiro deAlmeida, whose family operates the restaurant. �Butthe environmental agency and the university scientistshave established fixed feeding hours.�

The Anavilhanas Jungle Lodge has its own strict ruleswhen it comes to the guides it employs. Most lodgesrely on freelancers who come in from Manaus. TheAnavilhanas lodge hires only residents, which quicklypays off for the visitor. My guide, C�lio SilvaNascimento, not only knew all the best fishing spotsand how to navigate tricky river channels that comeand go with the seasons, but also had detailedknowledge of local flora and fauna, no matter howobscure.

That is important because the sheer abundance ofwildlife on view can be staggering, especially as onegets farther away from Manaus. I have never seen asmany birds, for example, as I did two years ago at thePousada Uacari, which is situated inside the Mamirau�nature reserve, 350 miles west of Manaus at theconfluence of the Solim�es and Japur� Rivers. Startledby the sound of our motorboat, huge flocks of snowyegrets, herons, cormorants, kites, tinamous, bitterns,ospreys and curassows took to the air as we navigatedan igarap�, or narrow tributary.

Like several of the new lodges in the region, thePousada Uacari is not on land, but sits on floatingrafts at a bend in the river. Here guests can viewwildlife in remarkable proximity. After dark, forinstance, I could see caimans, some as large as eightfeet, their eyes glowing like orange lanterns; somecame startlingly close, banging against the dock andmaking querulous grunts, a symphony that continuedthrough the night.

There is even a lodge that is literally up in thetrees. The Aria� Amazon Towers, opened in 1987 andrecently expanded and modernized, is a two-hour boatride northwest of Manaus. One of the oldest and by farthe largest of the jungle lodges, it has been visitedby celebrities like Bill Gates and the King and Queenof Spain. All 269 rooms are up in the jungle canopy,as much as 60 feet above the river, and connected toone another and the dining hall and common areas viaaerial walkways.

Only one lodge that I know of can claim to be on theAmazon River itself. The Amazon Riverside Hotel makesthe most of that distinction, offering excursions tosee the sun rise from a century-old British-builtnavigation beacon in the middle of the river; it alsohas a nature trail that leads to a hilltop observationpost with a commanding view of both the jungle and theriver, and has arranged hammocks at the dock forguests keen on doing nothing but watching the riverflow.

Just to remind guests where they are, the AmazonRiverside's reception area, built around a lagoon,displays the outsize skulls of an adult caiman and atoothy on�a, the Brazilian cougar. Lined up near thedining area is a series of jars with pickled remainsof some of the animals that have been found on or nearthe hotel grounds: poisonous snakes, scorpions andspiders, including a giant caranguejeira, or crabspider.

The owners of the Amazon Riverside are members ofManaus's flourishing Japanese community, whichmigrated to the region nearly a century ago to work onjute and pepper plantations. The Tsuji family catersto Japanese tourists, an effort that is reflected inan innovative menu that includes dishes such assashimi of tambaqui, a prized Amazon game fish, andtempura made with okra and ab�bora, the Brazilianequivalent of pumpkin.

The piranha fishing there was extraordinary. On aSunday afternoon I ventured out in a small motorboatwith a couple from the Tokyo area, Satoshi Tatsumi andKazuko Ito, and in less than two hours, we caughtnearly two dozen piranha, the largest of which we tookback to the hotel and ate in a tasty stew. The piranhawere so plentiful that Satoshi, a martial artsinstructor who was wearing a cast on his arm becauseof an injury suffered in a competition, was able tocatch them one-handed with nothing more than a simplebamboo pole and small pieces of beef as bait.

Many lodges organize visits to the homes of people wholive nearby, at the river's edge in houses usually onstilts. Known in Portuguese either as caboclos, a termequivalent to hillbilly, or more respectfully asribeirinhos, or river dwellers, they have limitedincomes and little contact with the rest of Brazil. Ifyou've never seen liquid latex being roasted on a spitover a fire to be made into rubber or if you don'tknow how manioc is turned into the golden flour thatis one of the Amazonian staples, then take one ofthese tours.

But sometimes there is an element of exploitation thatI find unsettling. The Amazon Riverside Hotel pays theriver-dwelling families that its guests are taken tosee, but some other lodges do not. When I was visitinganother lodge, I was taken to the home of IraciCantu�ria dos Santos, the 67-year-old matriarch of afamily of eight. I asked her whether she would makeany money from our visit. She replied, �Only if youbuy something,� and pointed to herbs and carved woodenanimals for sale.

To the river dwellers all visitors seem impossiblywell-off. But luxury, of course, is a relativeconcept. The reality is that it is tremendouslydifficult and expensive to bring in fuel, food andother supplies by boat, and no Amazon lodge I'vevisited would ever qualify as a five-star resort.

You are, after all, in the heart of the Amazon jungle,and your accommodations, no matter what they mightlack in grandeur, would have been the envy of thearea's first European explorers. They came looking for�El Dorado� and found a �green hell� instead.Fortunately, you, the 21st-century traveler, now haveother options.

VISITOR INFORMATION

HOW TO GET THERE

Until mid-2006, getting to Manaus from the UnitedStates was a cumbersome process that often involvedflying to Rio or S�o Paulo and then doubling back. ButBrazil's TAM Airlines (www.tam.com. br) now operates adaily five-hour flight from Miami. A round trip inlate September or October starts at $1,025; CopaAirlines (www.copaair. com) also has flights from $969,but those include a stop in Panama.

WHERE TO STAY

The packages mentioned are per person and includethree meals a day. Except as noted, transportationfrom and back to Manaus is also covered.

The Anavilhanas Jungle Lodge (55-92-3622- 8996;www.anavilhanaslodg e.com) has been open for only aboutsix months, and is perhaps the most elegant lodging inthe Amazon. It has 16 air-conditioned, wood-paneledrooms decorated with regional art, and an open-aircommon area stocked with DVDs and books. The minimumtwo-night package is 950 reals total, or $475 at 2reals to the dollar.

Unlike most other new lodges, the Amazon RiversideHotel (55-92-3622- 2789; www.amazonriverside hotel.com) ,which opened in 2002, is 40 minutes downstream fromManaus, not upstream. As a result, transportation tothe hotel includes a visit to the site where the RioNegro and the Solim�es join to form the Amazon. Thereare 15 rustic apartments, with fans but noair-conditioning. The one-night package is 625 reals;the hotel also offers a day-use option for 250 reals.

The main lure of the Pousada Uacari (97-3343-4160;www.uakarilodge. com.br) is its privileged location, inthe Mamirau� nature reserve about 90 minutes byspeedboat from Tef�, which is on the banks of theSolim�es River. There are 5 floating wood cabins,offering a total of 10 rustic apartments, with waterfor the showers and sinks coming directly from theriver. The minimum three-night package of 1,000 realsa person does not include transportation from Manausto Tef�.

In a competition for most unusual setting, the Aria�Amazon Towers (55-92-2121- 5000; www.ariau.tur. br)would win hands down. Just off the west bank of theRio Negro, its 269 rooms, some with air-conditioning,and trees growing through them, are up at the levelwhere monkeys live. One night costs 860 reals.

The Tiwa Amazonas Ecoresort (55-92-9995- 7892;www.tiwa.com. br), which opened in 2003, has 52air-conditioned rooms on stilts over a lagoon, plus acommon area with a restaurant, bar, game room and aview of the Manaus skyline. One night is 595 reals.

Less than an hour from Manaus by boat, the AmazonEcopark Jungle Lodge (55-21-2256- 8083;www.amazonecopark. com.br) has 64 rooms and 3bungalows, a beach on the Rio Negro and a pool. At 11a.m. and 5 p.m., there are opportunities to feed themonkeys. One night is 720 reals.

WHEN TO GO

�In September, October and November, the water levelsare quite low,� said Wedson Franklin Santos, a guidewho works at the Amazon Riverside Hotel, �so you getto see all the exuberance of the wildlife,� which isforced out into the open. He added that during themiddle of the year, when the flood plain is startingto recede, �the attraction is more the landscapeitself and not the animals, which are mostly inhiding.�

STAYING HEALTHY

Most doctors recommend a program of antimalarialmedicine, beginning several weeks before arrival andcontinuing during a trip. (I stopped taking suchprophylactics because of the unpleasant side effects,and besides, there is now a drug-resistant strain ofmalaria.) But there are other measures one can adoptto reduce the risk of mosquito-borne diseases likemalaria and dengue. Rather than going outdoors witharms exposed, for example, wear a long-sleeve shirtmade from a lightweight fabric. And do your best toavoid being outside during the period local peoplecall �the malaria hour,� about 5 to 7 p.m.